I think a truly good character builds in a fallen world.

We either get the anti-hero types that are damaged by the world and try to make something nice happen.

Or we get the heroes who effectively have to destroy themselves to preserve some minor victory.

Or we see a miraculous victory against a horde of enemies, and everything goes back to the way it was, and the poisoned world is gone.

These are all, in and of themselves stories that are a bit cynical. Even the last one that just kind of gives up and says "then magic happened and they all lived happily ever after". But that's not what a good victory looks like in the face of darkness.

We almost never see the hero build a community, family, society, or friendship that forges a good world, and pushes the boundaries of evil back, slowly & steadily over time. We don't see a good world forged by the heroes good actions; only saved. And I think that's a huge problem for our time, because we live in a world so ravaged by degeneracy, cynicism, and nihilism, that most people don't have anything to save. Our hero's story has to be about how to build something to save first, and keep it preserved in the face of evil, because no one is going to just straight up defeat the evil; just repel it for a while longer.